Those two pups pictured and Clay's Riley dog are head and shoulders better dogs than the others out of that litter. Both at less than 9 months old were on their way to making a strike dog. I would like to hear someone who has done a LOT of line breeding tell me how they cull. To me it is tempting to just keep the ones that by a year old are really making it happen and get rid of the others but maybe that is too hasty. I know there are a lot of stories of late bloomers becoming outstanding dogs but my experiences have taught me that most jam dogs I have seen the last few years are all early starting, fast maturing dogs and personally I value that alot! I don't want to wait 14-18 months for a dog to start contributing. If by 12 months they are not contributing and showing me they have the drive and want to then they are a cull and are not going to be used in a breeding program for dang sure. Not trying to steer the thread off corse just kinda asking a general question.
I line bred and inbred and culled hard for 15 years on a line of mtn curs. I started with good dogs and toward the end most any puppy would make a decent hog dog but many were early starting and very good dogs.
I was never in it for the money so I kept about 4 pups from a litter and then culled down to 1 or 2. I tested the pups at 8 weeks and throughout puppyhood, this included baying. willingness to swim and I took them out to the woods at 4 months to see which ones rolled out. I made sure that they were not rolling out because they were following the lead of another puppy etc... etc... I made sure that they were early starters. At 10 months I wanted them to strike and run with the big dogs. If they came back after 15 minutes it was a major concern for me. My reasons for all of this was that if I have to wait until the pup is 1.5 years of age then the offspring will be the same or the line will be regressing. I just couldn't keep a pup for that long to decide if it was a cull or not. Same thing if you have to use a training collar excessively. You will produce pups that need the same form of training. When you get to the point that you need new blood then: 1. find a dog that is somewhat related and has the same qualities as your dogs and possibly bring something to the table to enhance the strain, or 2, breed your best gyp to a stud that is somewhat related and keep as many pups from that cross and then select the best possible pup to breed into your strain so that you bring in a small amount of new blood but does not really change your strain. The idea is to give the strain a boost, not to lose what you have strived for. This is how I did it and it worked for me. You just have to call it like it is and to not have kennel blindness. It takes a lot of money to do this. I'm retired now so will not do this again.
IMO, I think that the best thing to do is to get 4 or 5 friends with the same goals and each keep at least several dogs and develop a breeding program that includes a written hunting standard that describes how the dog/gyp should hunt and how it is built to include the size and weight. I would like to be a part of something like this....I am partial to the MTN CUR though...
